What is Skin Laxity?
As you age, your skin can become loose and can look less appealing. Your skin may even appear unhealthy to you or embarrassing. If you have seen this happen to your skin and you know you love to wear ¾ length tops, longer shorts or turtle necks—you may want to review the reasons this occurs and the ways you can improve it.
Usually, sagging or crepe-like skin develops because of the aging process or bad habits throughout our younger years. All types of various stressors in life also contribute to poor skin health and sagging skin, including overstretching of the skin during pregnancy or with rapid weight gain or weight loss!
Here are a variety of reasons your skin laxity and overall health can decline.
Reasons skin heath declines:
- Aging
- Dehydration
- Chronic stress (can cause inflammation)
- Chronic health issues (Diabetes, heart problems, GI health problems: ulcerative colitis, Gastritis, Celiac disease, Lyme and others)
- Genetic factors
- Poor diet
- Lack of vitamins/minerals/supplements (vitamin C, E, A, collagen, elastin)
- Lack of exercise
- Too much sun
- Smoking
- Alcohol
Skin health: exercising and having other health problems under control
If your skin is losing its elasticity or firmness because of age and other factors in your life, there are ways to improve it to look and feel better. You can help fix skin that looks crepe-like or saggy with different exercises that promote blood flow. This helps to oxygenate the blood and helps skin become firmer. There are even specific ones for sagging skin. Of course, consult a trainer for assistance depending on your skin laxity issues and where they are located. Dermatologists may have options for you such as vitamins or creams to use—or you can try exercises for ‘turkey neck.’
Always make sure you are also addressing any health issues as well before starting an exercise routine. Issues like gastrointestinal diseases, heart disease and high blood pressure, diabetes, cancer can directly affect your skin because they have a harder time getting the nutrients from your foods. These conditions among many others also cause pre-mature aging, causing skin damage. Talk to a nutritionist to find out what diet or foods are best to stick with for certain medical conditions.
Supplements that can improve your skin sagging issues:
- Collagen (For building protein and perfect for improve skin)
- Elastin (Protein that helps connective tissues and can improve skin)
- MSM: Cellular rejuvenator (Inside and out—your skin)
- Green Tea
- Vitamin C (Essential for collagen building)
- Vitamin A / Retinoic acid
- Vitamin E (Antioxidant for skin, immune function, blood thinner)
- Zinc (UV ray protection)
- Fish oil
- CO Enzyme Q10
Supplements are great but improving diet is also essential
Collagen and elastin are way up there on the list of helpful supplements to make the skin stronger and healthier, and have less sag. The type of collagen and the brand you choose matters! The molecular size of collagen determines whether it will get absorbed or not. At HERA Health Care we only carry brands that are scientifically proven to work.
Vitamins like E can help improve blood flow, along with iron for red blood cell production. Zinc, vitamin A and C are generally for the immune system and can keep you healthy and your skin from bumps, blemishes, and help make skin firmer. Green tea is a high level antioxidant, like vitamin C and is also critical for skin health and wellness—it is a great body detoxifier as well.
As we age, we need more supplements because ones that we have like collagen and elastin start to diminish in our bodies, just like hormones and stomach acid. It is important that we eat the right diet, with many vegetables, fish and other key items that improve the oils, vitamins and minerals in our bodies. There is a direct link between diet and skin health, according to research in the Dermato Endocrinology papers. The rest of nutrients need to be supplemented to achieve a healthier immune system and in turn, you will have healthier skin.
If you don’t want to completely change or diet or take several supplements a day, you can purchase an at home tool to help improve your skin.
Home use device to improve skin, by Nuskin.com called Body Spa AgeLOC
Nuskin.com has a device called the Galvanic Spa System. This is a hand held device you can use at home to go over your skin—just about anywhere from your face to your legs. This is a smart device and is clinically proven to treat areas of your skin that need improvement in tone, appearance, and areas that need to become firm again. You can purchase this Nuskin product if you think it would be beneficial for your skin health and improvement due to aging or any other health condition that wreaks havoc on your skin.
Devices for skin improvement might not work for everyone. They also require commitment as in using them regularly, otherwise they will not work. Buying and placing them in a drawer or on a shelf is not enough. If you know you are not going to dedicate 10 minutes at least 2-3 times a week then it is useless to purchase such a device.
Not into supplements or home use devices? Try TempSure RF Platform to improve skin quality
Cynosure.com has a device called TempSure RF that targets skin issues and can smooth out lines and wrinkles and much more. The system essentially heats deep into the skin to regenerate collagen and reduce the appearance of these skin issues.
Ways TempSure RF platform device can improve your skin:
- Generally smooths skin in areas like thighs, abdomen, arms
- Minimizes facial fine lines and wrinkles like:
- Frown lines
- Crow’s feet
- Smile lines
HERA Health Care offers a variety of laser treatments that are non invasive and have no downtime. We offer:
TempSure Body and Envy for face
Nothing seems to be improving your skin health and laxity?
Sometimes it can be a simple fix and knowing which vitamins and minerals are important for your skin and why is essential. Maybe just looking at your diet, exercise regime and overall health and hormonal balance could be the beginning of addressing your skin health issues.
You may have some underlying gene or medical problem that might need to be addressed. Make sure before adding supplements or a different routine to your schedule to improve skin health, you have baseline vitamin and mineral blood work. Consider a comprehensive medical consultation to evaluate nutrition and inflammation levels as well as nutrition and methylation testing. Call HERA Health Care for an appointment today at 805-379-9110.
If you are still having issues improving your skin health after all these recommendations, you should talk to your doctor.
In the Thousand Oaks area? Please schedule a consultation with Dr. Mirela Cernaianu at HERA Healthcare—she can help assess your laxity situation and develop a course of action to help you.
